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This paper aims to investigate the role of boards in owner‐managed small to medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs), and seeks answers to the questions of whether boards generally enhance good governance in SMEs, and whether the use of outside board members plays a significant role. Finally, the paper seeks to examine the question of whether in practice owner‐managers see their boards as a resource.

The paper is based on a study of the ownership and control structure in 1,313 SMEs and an interview survey of 1,040 Danish owner‐managed SMEs.

The analysis of the empirical studies indicates that the role of a board as a resource is more important than its control role, which suggests that there should be a multi‐theory approach to board roles in SMEs. It also indicates that good governance appears to be associated with the existence of boards and of outside board members, and finally that boards in SMEs remain an untapped resource.

The paper contributes to the empirical literature on the role of boards. It contributes to the understanding of the role of boards in SMEs and to whether boards enhance good governance in SMEs. It also gives an insight as to whether boards are an untapped resource in SMEs.

In mature global business-to-business (B2B) product markets, management of external sales channels, governed by contractual relationships, is a key determinant of business performance. However, existing sales channel management literature lacks focus on contractual governance and reseller management success. The purpose of the study is to systematically review different governance theories in relation to sales channel management and to show which factors are the most influential in making or keeping external sales channels effective.

A case study on a large B2B information and communication technology (ICT) company is used to reflect on the way the different theoretical governance perspectives explain sales channel management success. Interviews and mini-questionnaires were used to collect data.

Expressions of interdependence and equality alongside persevered personal relationships are important in managing daily business activities and in avoiding bad will at the reseller’s grass-root level. Future-oriented planning, long-term-oriented support and jointly set incentive systems are important for reseller management. Degree of professional management sets resellers apart through shifts in power balance.

A multi-theory governance perspective offers a holistic view over reseller management and provides a comprehensive view over different sales channel management issues and their relative importance.

The findings highlight the importance of long-term orientation and cooperation in setting up a reseller management system to gain and nurture distributors’ trust and commitment towards the manufacturer.

The study is the first to comprehensively use governance perspective in studying reseller management.

The purpose of this study was to investigate how personality traits influence participative behaviour in an Online Cancer Community (OCC).

Qualitative semi-structured interviews were conducted with 42 users of one of the largest OCCs in Australia – Cancer Council Online Community in New South Wales (NSW).

The results showed that extraversion, emotional stability and agreeableness traits influence posting behaviour, whereas the conscientiousness trait influences lurking behaviour. The openness trait did not affect either posters or lurkers’ online behaviour.

The research highlights the pivotal role of personality traits in users’ decisions to post or lurk using a multi-theory perspective that combined the social exchange theory and the Five-Factor Model. Future studies should explore personality traits that can benefit from online participation in an OCC to transition only lurkers who may benefit from posting.

Insights from the study inform OCC practitioners and moderators when designing the OCC platform. Except for the openness trait, lurkers and posters exhibited different attitudes, which indicates that integrating these findings in the OCC design can facilitate adopting strategies to elicit more participation by OCC users.

This is the first study that explored the role of personality traits in users’ decisions to participate in an OCC.

Can sustainability disclosures be a tool for executing image restoration strategies after corporate manslaughter? This is the question explored in this study of Costa Crociere's sustainability reports after the Concordia disaster.

Merging traditional textual content analysis with visual analysis and supported by machine learning tools, this is a predominantly qualitative study framed by legitimacy theory, image restoration theory and impression management.

Costa Crociere's voluntary sustainability reporting is strongly influenced by a mix of text and visual signals that distract readers' attention from the disaster. A “nothing really happened” communication strategy pervades the disclosures, with the only rational motivation being to change perceptions and erase memories of this tragic and avoidable event.

Although the analysis covered multiple sources of corporate information, media coverage was not one of them. A more in-depth exploration of sustainability reporting in the cruise industry, including evidence of similar cases, to test impression management theory would be a worthwhile avenue for future research.

While Costa Crociere technically followed the customary guidelines of disclosing human resource impacts, there was almost no acknowledgement of the people involved in the accident. Costa Concierevastly understated their responsibility for the accident, did not apologize, and conveyed very little remorse. The majority of disclosures centred on disaster recovery management.

The authors discuss why and how a company can overcome a legitimacy threat by completely freezing its voluntary sustainability reporting, and the authors show how a company can restore its image by minimizing specific aspects of an accident and shifting attention from the human victims to corporate operations. Incorporating image recognition driven by AI models and combining the results with narrative disclosures contributes an innovative and original analysis technique to the field of impression management. In addition, this research also contributes to our knowledge on the cruise industry – a sector currently under scrutiny for its ethical, social and environmental practices.

This paper researches export marketing strategy (EMS) archetypes of agri-food exporters and organizational determinants that pose as their antecedent factors, using resource-based, dynamic capabilities and contingency theories as theoretical framework in a multi-county research setting. A twofold objective is specified – to explore hitherto used EMS and to examine differences between agri-food exporters based on organizational determinants.

Comparative research design, quantitative methodology, an etic/emic approach, descriptive and causal data analyses were employed. EMS archetypes were portrayed on radial plots, while six hypotheses were tested using MANOVA.

The tactical coordinator was identified as a universal EMS archetype. Diversity of archetypes was found as results of the effect of organizational determinants, confirming their ambivalent impacts rooted in the resources, capabilities and contingencies exporters have to face.

Main limitations arise from the sample choice in international business, concentration only on organizational determinants, survey as a data collection technique and reliance on self-report data from managers. Nevertheless, several theoretical and practical implications are defined.

To the authors’ knowledge, this paper is the first to apply the EMS archetype perspective to the agri-food industry in a developing country context and in an economic crisis context. Its multi-theory approach is supplemented with researched countries' national culture perspective and institutional background to extend understanding of agri-food firms' EMS archetypes.

U.S. industry–university (I–U) relations around intellectual property (IP) have become increasingly contentious since the Bayh-Dole Act of 1980, while especially lucrative patents and licenses resulting from biomedical and pharmaceutical discoveries capture the headlines. Some assert that I–U relations around IP are in crisis, others suggest that no such problem exists, and still others bemoan the “increasing commercialization” of U.S. education. This chapter develops a multi-level model of I–U IP dynamics, drawing on pluralistic, multi-theory perspectives, field interviews, and secondary data. The model includes three levels: the institutional (economy) level, I–U (sector) level, and the organizational level. These levels jointly affect the immediate context of any deal. The chapter closes with a discussion of this model's implications for further research and some theoretical speculations.

Despite the abundance of B2B loyalty programs (LPs), the research on their interplay with relationship marketing is scarce. The purpose of this paper is to investigate a LP (a relational practice) on a transactional business market to test if and how a B2B LP affects relationship outcomes.

The study is based on dyadic research in a multi-theory framework. Data were collected from 200 small and medium enterprises that purchase office supplies from a company and merged with the company’s internal records.The formative-reflective measurement model is estimated using structural equation modeling – partial least squares (SEM-PLS).

Relationship quality (RQ) directly affects sales and customer share of wallet. The effect is strengthened by customer activity in a LP. RQ results directly in a longer tenure and willingness to recommend only for members of a LP.

RQ is driven mainly by customer’s evaluation of prior experience with a supplier, while a LP is based on a forward-looking promise of a reward. The results of the study point to the level of customers’ activity in a LP as a boundary condition of the program’s efficacy.

RQ affects both attitudinal and behavioral outcomes but through distinct mechanisms. Once a supplier is a preferred one, LP membership strengthens the attitudinal outcome of a relationship. The effect of RQ on company performance is magnified by the level of customer activity in a LP but not by the membership status.

The theoretical framework integrates transaction costs, relational contract and relational exchange theories to investigate a LP on a transactional market. The study adds to the scant literature on LPs in business-to-business and provides evidence for similarities and differences in comparison to consumer research.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a reconceptualization of existing constructs within the inter-organizational relationship (IOR) domain to face two main issues: the proliferation of constructs emerged because of a fast-growing body of literature, and the interchangeable and ambiguous use of constructs.

First, the authors surveyed the literature regarding IORs using a structured process supported by the use of bibliometric technique, and then the authors organized an expert panel process that contributes to refine the reconceptualization of the constructs.

The results of the analyses allow a further confirmation of the inconsistency in the definition of IOR constructs and provide a clear reconceptualization of the inter-organizational network and alliance constructs, recognized as the most relevant in this domain.

Being the first attempt to deal with the issue of construct reconceptualization in the IOR domain practically, and considering that clear construct definitions serve as a necessary basis for theory building, this paper has relevant implications for the development of theory related to the different types of IORs.

The objective of the Contemporary Marketing Practices (CMP) research program is to develop an understanding of how firms relate to their markets in a manner that integrates both traditional and more modern views of marketing, and incorporates an understanding of both the antecedents and consequences of different practices. This paper aims to review its first decade.

The paper adopts a theoretical approach. It reviews the history of CMP research and its outcomes. The assessment concludes with a discussion of the program's contribution to marketing knowledge and some issues and challenges for future research.

Now a decade old, the CMP research program has undertaken research in over 15 countries. The study finds that it has made a unique contribution to marketing knowledge by bridging the gap between theory and practice.

By adopting a multi‐paradigm philosophy and a multi‐method approach, a broad perspective has been achieved that integrates the traditional managerial view of marketing with relational and process arguments.

Firms in the early stage of their organisational lifecycle (ESFs) are subject to concerns founded on a requirement for strategic flexibility, prompting engagement in inter-organisational relationships such as outsourcing. However, studies of the management control dynamics of these relationships are rare. This paper aims to respond by empirically examining the influence of ESF managers on the ongoing management control of such relationships.

A single outsourcing case study is utilised to provide evidence in examining a multi-theoretical framework that adopts a complex adaptive system (CAS) perspective as a qualitative analytical framework, along with the existing accounting theory on control adoption.

Focused on management concerns with tensions between inter-organisational control and strategic flexibility, this paper identifies reasons for the adoption of management controls by an ESF. The inter-organisational system explored in this paper emphasises the importance of adopting a holistic epistemology in understanding changes in control adoption.

This paper extends current theoretical perspectives on control adoption to consider the inter-organisational control concerns of ESF managers.

The insights identified in this paper provide a systemic framework to identify potential organisational and environmental influences on control problems, emphasising environmental co-evolution rather than achievement of ideal equilibrium states.

The intended contribution is to extend the management control literature to consider the effect of organisational lifecycle on the adoption of new inter-organisational management controls in the wake of ongoing trade-off between competing inter-organisational requirements.